Giant Squid

I am nosing around the old Giant Squid attacks here mainly because with Giant Squid finds (beachings and in nets) you have an actual body to study (discount the Globster finds which often turn out to be decaying whale blubber) and so a respectable science has developed to study Giant Squid (Architeuthis dux) and, the more recent;y found (and larger), Colossal Squid (Mesonychoteuthis hamiltoni) finds while the squid attacks and sightings tend to hang in limbo where they can be dismissed by experts and accepted by those who want to believe. For more discussion see:

http://www.forteantimes.com/forum/showthread.php?s=&threadid=4662

and will throw more info in as I get it ;)

See more discussion here:

Giant Squid attacks have been discussed here:

http://www.tonmo.com/phpBB/viewtopic.php?t=494

and a critique and discussion of the national geographic article is here:

http://www.tonmo.com/phpBB/viewtopic.php?t=491

For a great overview you should watch this Discovery channel documentary on the Colossal Squid.

Although it appears in 20,000 Leagues Under the Sea (see below) it gets an earlier outing in Herman Melville's 'Moby Dick' Chapter 59: The Squid from 1851:

quote:

Almost forgetting for the moment all thoughts of Moby Dick, we now gazed at the most wondrous phenomenon which the secret seas have hitherto revealed to mankind. A vast pulpy mass, furlongs in length and breadth, of a glancing cream-color, lay floating on the water, innumerable long arms radiating from its centre, and curling and twisting like a nest of anacondas, as if blindly to catch at any hapless object within reach. No perceptible face or front did it have; no conceivable token of either sensation or instinct; but undulated there on the billows, an unearthly, formless, chance-like apparition of life.

As with a low sucking sound it slowly disappeared again, Starbuck still gazing at the agitated waters where it had sunk, with a wild voice exclaimed- "Almost rather had I seen Moby Dick and fought him, than to have seen thee, thou white ghost!"

"What was it, Sir?" said Flask.

"The great live squid, which, they say, few whale-ships ever beheld, and returned to their ports to tell of it."

But Ahab said nothing; turning his boat, he sailed back to the vessel; the rest as silently following.

Some cases:

Early reports of cephalopod attacks come from Pierre Denys de Montfort and Reverend Moses Harvey. The former offered a number of vague tales and a good illustration taken from a now demolished church while the latter was given a piece of tentacle from a fisherman (he established the world's first giant squid exhibit in 1874). However, some earlier reports of sea serpents attacking whales may also be misidentified squid.

Cape Ann (1818)

quote:

From a statement made by a Kennebec shipmaster in 1818, and sworn to before a justice of the peace in Kennebec county, Maine, it would seem that the notable sea serpent and whale are sometimes found in conflict. At six o'clock in the afternoon of June 21st, in the packet Delia, plying between Boston and Hallowell, when Cape Ann bore west southwest about two miles, steering north northeast, Captain Shubael West, and fifteen others on board with him, saw an object directly ahead which he had no doubt was the sea serpent, or the creature so often described under that name, engaged in fight with a large hump-back whale that was endeavoring to elude the attack.

The serpent threw up his tail from twentyfive to thirty feet in a perpendicular direction, striking the whale by it with tremendous blows rapidly repeated, which were distinctly heard and very loud for two or three minutes. They then both disappeared, moving in a west southwest direction, but after a few minutes reappeared in shore of the packet, and about under the sun, the reflection of which was so strong as to prevent their seeing so distinctly as at first, when the serpent's fearful blows with his tail were repeated and clearly heard as before.

They again went down for a short time, and then came up to the surface under the packet's larboard quarter, the whale appearing first and the serpent in pursuit, who was again seen to shoot up his tail as before, which he held out of water some time, waving it in the air before striking, and at the same time, while his tail remained in this position, he raised his head fifteen or twenty feet, as if taking a view of the surface of the sea. After being seen in this position a few minutes, the serpent and whale again sunk and disappeared, and neither were seen after by any on board. It was Captain West's opinion that the whale was trying to escape, as he spouted but once at a time on coming to the surface, and the last time he appeared he went down before the serpent came up.

From Chapter 7 of the Reverend Henry Cheever's "The Whale and His Captors"

Alecton (1861)

Sort of attacks on giant squid but one was said to be spotted by the ship Alecton North of Tenerife and Capitaine Bouyer it was clearly dying when they saw it and shot at it and when they hauled it aboard they only managed to get the tail on baord.

It appears to be this report which influenced Jules Verne to write about the Giant Squid attack in 20,000 Leagues Under the Sea (as can be read in this extract from Chapter 18).

http://www.mun.ca/sgs/science/march378.html

Portugal Cove (1873)

The Newfoundland case which was reported to the Reverend Moses Harvey which appears to have invovled a couple of fisherman being attacked by a giant squid and they defended themselves with an axe and cut off two tentacles which they gave to the Reverend.

Cape San Roque (8th July, 1875)

Another 'sea serpent' attacking a sprem whale was reported in the Illustrated London News of 2nd November 1875 by Captain Drevar of the bark Pauline.

The Brunswick (1930-1933)

The Brunswick was supposed to attacked three times befor eit was dragged down into the propeller and killed. The attack was later reported by the Captain Arne Grønningsaeter in the Swedish journal Naturen (in 1946)

Soviet Whaler (1965)

The whaler crew allegedly saw a giant squid and a 40 ton whale fighting and they were oth found dead later.

Danger Point, South Africa (1966)

Two lighthouse men said they saw a giant squid fighting with a baby whale.

Geronimo (March, 2003)

During the Jules Verne Trophy race in 2003 one of the main ships, the Geronimo was said to have been attacked by a giant squid.

This would be the simplest one too follow up as it was the most recent but follow up reports after the global media deluge have been lacking - emails are in the electronic aether to their support team.

For more indepth discussion see:

http://www.tonmo.com/phpBB/viewtopic.php?t=1536

Japan (2003)

There have been recent pictures emergin from Japan. The first set show a live Giant Squid in some rock pools (click the blue link at the bottom of the page for more pictures). The second set show a Giant Squid chasing a jig baited with another largish squid. The latter show that Giant Squid can be found at the surface in conditions other than dying, dead or being eaten by a predator.

Apart from the most recent all the online reports tend to repeat the same information and have just enough detail to be believable which suggests they come from a sinle source which might have not be thoroughly researched - we'll see what we can dig up on these (and more to come).

Further reading:

Bouyer, F., Moquin-Tandon, A & Milne-Edwards, H. (1861) Poulpe géant observé entre Madère et Ténériffe. Comptes Rendus de l'Académie des Sciences. 53. 1263 - 7.

Denys de Montfort, P.(1801) Histoire naturelle des mollusques, in BUFFON : Histoire naturelle générale et particulière, Paris, Dufart, 53-57 -- Mollusques, 2 : 256-412.

Ellis, Richard. (1998) In Search of the Giant Squid.

Ellis, Richard. (1994) Monsters of the Sea. Alfred A. Knopf, N.Y. The Kraken pp 113-164.

Heuvelmans, Bernard (1969) In the Wake of the Sea Serpents. Hart Davis.

Heuvelmans, Bernard (2003) The Kraken and the Colossal Octopus: in the Wake of the Sea-Monsters: In the Wake of Sea-monsters. Kegan Paul an exapnded version of the above (£85 for 850 pages!! I might wait for the paperback) - extra info at Kegan paul which includes the Fortean Times review.